Last month, Dawn Williamson shared her thoughts on the TV upfronts with Ad Age.
The TV upfronts are upon us once again. As networks showcase their upcoming programming to buyers, it’s a fresh chance to take a step back and see where the vast media industry stands when it comes to TV advertising.
Over the past few years, some advertisers have started to believe that TV is a thing of the past. Social media companies in particular often claim TV is difficult to buy, is “just for branding” or that last-click attribution is the same as driving sales.
But this upfronts season, TV—in all its forms—is more accessible, more targeted and more accountable than ever before. Thanks to data, technology and powerful AI tools, multiscreen TV is now being seen as a full-funnel advertising solution, effectively driving sales in ways traditionally credited to social channels while still delivering the exceptional branding capabilities it has always been known for. As a result, even companies that have built their businesses on social advertising are looking for better ways to access and secure premium multiscreen TV advertising inventory.
With the right partners, brands today can easily tap into the power of premium video content across leading global publishers. Enhanced with accurate and reliable first party data to ensure the right audience is met, those ad experiences can then be delivered across screens. But great premium content on TV and streaming is still finite, so the upfronts play a key role in guaranteeing purchase of this valuable entity.
Here’s why agencies still lean into the upfronts:
TV Advertising Puts Brands at the Center of Relevant Moments
In TV and streaming, live events bring viewership that is unsurpassed in other media forms. Viewership numbers don’t lie: audiences still flock to major cultural moments, from live sports to award shows and global cultural touchstones like the Olympics, especially as many reach new audiences through streaming. Viewers of these events are focused and often watching in groups: sports typically garner 31% higher visual attention compared to the average program, and 54% of sports viewers say they often watch live sports with others.
TV still provides the premium, lean-back entertainment that has always made it popular (81% of streaming happens on the big screen), and it drives engagement in a way social cannot. Furthermore, as much as habits have evolved, audiences across all generations are still watching TV, including the coveted millennial and Gen Z viewers: Research from Go Addressable and MRI-Simmons found that 80% of adults 18 to 34 watch both traditional and streaming TV.
Advertisers and brands that value premium content—defined as content delivered transparently, in a trusted brand-safe environment and seen by real people within a high-quality viewing experience—are still turning to the upfronts as the best way to guarantee their brands reach engaged audiences.
TV Advertising Reaches Audiences with Accuracy and Transparency
Thanks to addressable TV advertising, multiscreen TV now outperforms digital across many key advertising benchmarks. And, unlike social media, multiscreen TV offers advertisers a direct connection into homes, delivering impactful and relevant messages thanks to deterministic data that matches audiences to authenticated households. This strategy is even more impactful when advertisers bring their own first-party data to the table; in fact, this approach is much more accurate than IP address matching, which digital advertising heavily relies on.
Like social, multiscreen TV can identify and reach households in-market for specific products while leveraging creative versioning to drive calls and clicks. And, with AI capabilities improving, advertisers can tap into creative AI tools to create multiple versions of ads for TV quickly and at a lower cost, making upfront buying accessible to more brands than ever.
When advertisers use multiscreen TV, they receive transparency. With the right partner, they receive insight into exactly where their advertising ran and a clear tie of exposures to outcomes. Unlike other mediums, TV has protections in place for advertisers, regardless of how or where they enter so they always run in a brand-safe environment.
TV Advertising: The Great Legitimizer
Have you ever watched an ad on TV and thought “Wow, this company has finally made it”? Television lends legitimacy and credibility to businesses in a way that social simply does not; advertisers know that when their ad is seen on the biggest screen in the house, they are driving consumer connections. And, while many advertisers look to TV as a pure brand awareness play, multiscreen TV has evolved into a performance driver, delivering measurable results at every stage of the marketing funnel.
Multiscreen TV isn’t only about reaching a mass audiences; it is proven to measurably establish brand trust and increase brand recall. In a study that looked at how TV content performed compared to user-generated content (UGC), TV was found to produce a 58% higher unaided recall, which not only increases awareness but consideration.
Further, consistent TV advertising enables long-term reach and can drive KPIs such as website traffic which are valuable in driving consumer action. In one analysis, restaurant brands saw an average of 85% increase in returning website visitors month-over-month from TV advertising.
Television content in all of its forms is still a powerful way to connect with audiences. And as data, technology and AI continue to improve, the promise of TV advertising will continue to improve along with it.
This upfront season, agencies of all sizes are still asking for TV, because when their clients ask for measurable results and brand safety assurances, they know that TV will deliver.
This article has been modified from the original content here on AdAge.com.
